By Rose O. Sherman, EdD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN
How do I stay optimistic and hopeful when things seem to be headed in the wrong direction? This is a question that a young leader recently asked me during a coaching call. For months, she has been telling staff that they are making progress, and things seem better with COVID-19. That worked until last week when the number of new cases soared in her geographic area, and staff again became very fearful about their safety and increasing workload.
There are no easy answers to what has become a crucible time for the country and healthcare delivery systems. Planning at a national level has not been good. Nurse leaders again find themselves with challenges involving PPE availability, staffing, childcare, furloughs, staff illness, and redeployment. This young leader told me that her staff feels expendable. These feelings are understandable with Kaiser Health News reporting this week that close to 600 frontline healthcare workers have already died.
The situation today reminds me of stories that my mother told me about growing up in Ireland during World War 2. Each night as a teenager, she would sit in the dark on a beach near her home and watch German Bombers fly across the Irish Sea to bomb London. The feeling was one of helplessness, she said. Occasionally one of the bombers would crash into the sea. She wondered when it would all end. They gained strength from listening to Winston Churchill as he spoke to the British people on the BBC. He often said that when you are going through hell – keep going. Everyone needed to soldier on. And so they did.
Whenever my Mom faced challenges after this – I would ask how she was doing. She always said the same thing – I am soldiering on Rose – it is all I know how to do in this situation. And so I think this is also true today. There is no sugar coating what is happening. I told this young leader to tell her staff the truth that she, too, was struggling and trying to do her best to keep them feel safe and cared for. There is power in realistically facing the truth and soldiering on in the best ways that you can.
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Read Rose Sherman’s book – The Nurse Leader Coach: Become the Boss No One Wants to Leave
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